Round 4

Round 4…a week late. Unfortunately I had to push this week back because I had some lip/dental issues I had to take care of before the Cisplatin came in and made a royal mess of my mouth. Methotrexate treated me good the first time, but my 2nd round of it – not so good. The drug can settle in pockets of your body, for me it was my bottom lip. Swollen/huge/peeling/bright red (I’m talking 4 year old with a cherry ice pop in mid-July). My bottom lip has always been fuller than my top so you can imagine how frightening I was looking. Not only that, but it hurt! It is still not completely healed but I had no choice but to get some dental work done before going in for chemo this week.

Funny story…my friend Gina and I felt like having our summer toes pampered so we went and got pedicures. Here I am, all self conscious about my monkey-mouth but I thought hell, I feel like having cute toes. I am not trying to impress anyone. So we finish up, are sitting at the nail dryers and I notice this woman staring at me. Blatant stare-a-thon. I figured she must have noticed my headscarf or maybe my metaport and wanted to speak to me about cancer or something. Finally she interrupts us…”excuse me miss, I just have to tell you that you have got the most gorgeous mouth I have ever seen. And that smile! I am an art teacher and let me just tell you, you have a perfect T-line, all of your features are lined up perfectly and THAT MOUTH! It’s gorgeous! You are very blessed.” I guess I didn’t know how to react or was just in so much shock because in the car ride after Gina explained that I laughed in the woman’s face like a crazy person. I remember saying “HAHAHwwhhhat!!?? They are swollen and chapped and gross!!” And she just kept saying to me “don’t tell me that, no one needs to know that – I just wanted you to know how gorgeous I thought your lips were, I’d love to draw you.” I stopped laughing at the woman and took her ironic compliment. What I really felt like saying to her was “would you mind following me around for the next 7 months and please compliment me like that whenever I am feeling miserable and self-conscious?” Thank god for people like that. She made my day. Another lesson in not worrying about what people are thinking.

Back to the chompers…last Saturday was rough, but I got through it. Two cavities filled and two teeth pulled. Normally my dentist would have tried to save those two teeth but with the harshness of the chemo and the infection that were in them, it would have been a lost cause. I would have never healed. Luckily they are not my two front teeth or anything ☺. The pain wasn’t so bad in the teeth or gums but more so in the yanking/pulling of my poor cherry-ice-in-July lips. Ouch. I must say I have some luck with the people that take care of me. My dentist left it up to me as to when I wanted to make my appointment, pushed all his time aside and spent 3 hours on me. By the 4th tooth we both needed a break, I do need to get one more tooth pulled at some point. The office also wrote me a very nice letter and took 30% off of the cost of the work that was done. Here comes another plug - go see Dr. Midlige in Mountain Lakes, awesome guy.

Made it into NY for a dreaded round of Cisplatin/Doxorubicin on Tuesday and came home last evening. They drug you up good when you are on Cisplatin because it makes you 24/7 nauseous. I spent most of the week asleep and/or out of it. This time around I am going to be smarter about this drug. I need to force myself to drink at least 3 liters a day to flush this poisoneous life-saver out of my body. The first time I just slept and completely dehydrated myself to the point of a bad fever and was slapped inpatient for 5 grueling days. I definitely don’t want to go through that again.

Yesterday I had another x-ray of my upper arm and met with the surgeon for a 2nd time. Good GREAT news, the chemo is working ☺ (my smile is much bigger than this emoticon can show). You can see the difference in my shoulder and the surgeon can see it in the x-ray. I can feel it, too. I no longer have shooting pains down my arm, and my fingers no longer go numb. I feel very fortunate because there is a good amount of people/tumors that do not respond well (if at all) to chemotherapy. Thank God. If I weren’t responding to it, they would need to move up my surgery ASAP. I’m glad this is not the case, because my surgeon explained the situation very bluntly “I can save your arm, but the chemo will save your life”. And I am all about life.

Every year Sloan has a “Pediatric Prom” which is the cutest idea ever. Department stores like Bloomingdale’s donate tiny prom dresses that all of the kids can try on for the event, then they get to keep it when it’s over. It is a huge deal for the kids, they even broadcasted it on the news. Unfortunately I couldn’t snoop around the prom with my camera because I was asleep most of the day, but I woke up and saw familiar faces on the TV. My mom went down with my camera and caught a few shots:

Balloons balloons, party party


My nurse, Michelle. (my absolute favorite woman there)


Dr. Meyers (One of my oncologists. How great is that little yellow crooked polka-dot bow tie!?)

That recaps my week. I can’t thank you all enough for your cards, emails, gifts, etc. etc. I am SO overdue with my thank you cards and return emails, so I apologize about that. But I will get to them. Love you's.